Thread: Gravely Weld Crack

As you can see in the pictures, I have cracks in the welds on the top of the Pro Turn 460 deck. I have made contacts with both the local shop and the Gravely corporation the last couple of days. The question I have is what should I expect from Gravely? The mower has 58 hours on it and it is 5 months old. My concern is the welding process could have had a flaw and a small crack could in the long term turn into something bigger. What are your thoughts?
Thanks, BR

Not good, I own Gravely's and SCAG's and I honestly think the fabrication on the frame of the Gravely is second to none. With that being said, I would imagine that Gravely will take care of you, it is only 5 months old. Whatever happens, I would make sure it is taken care of, welds do not fix themselves, or get better with time.

I wish you the best of luck getting it taken care of in a satisfactory manner!

Thats not the deck that is up in front of the foot platform. You can see from the pictures that 95% of the weld was on the frame not making good contact with the second piece of metal. These machines are hand welded so somebody must have been having a bad day or not paying attention. I don't believe that is structural. Still I wouldn't worry to much. Gravely has great customer service and will get you taken care of. I would want a new machine simple on the basis of the fact even if it is sanded down and rewelded then painted you will be able to see where the repair was done. That plus the fear in the back of my mind wondering if other weld joints on that machine are the same way.

This is the response I got from Gravely. "Dealers have been notified if this situation would happen there is a kit to weld in to reinforce this area. This repair the dealer will do and file with us for warranty."
I then emailed the following statements and questions. "Will you please go into detail on what the kit will do for me. Will the area be powder coated so the paint does not flake and rust in the future? What will it look like when they are finished? It sounds like this has been an issue in the past if there is a kit to fix the problem. Can you assure me that there are no other shotty welds from the welder on that particular day?
The next reply from them was this:"The kit consists of the plate that needs to be welded as reinforcement, primer for the plate and spray paint to paint the plate once it has been installed." That is all they sent. Do the people of Lawnsite think this is fair solution to the problem? I still have not taken it to my local dealer to see what they say. I plan on doing it on the weekend.
Thanks

PDC paint coating will be compromised as if they have a weld on kit, the paint will be ground down to weld, then touched up with spray paint. There is no way on earth to re-powder coat it without stripping it down.

One of the few drawbacks of PDC, touch ups are filled with fail.

Whats funny is people like to bag on companies like Bad Boy for robotic welding, but this is the reason why robotics is superior.....the car industry went to robots for the same reason. Humans can not be relied on to do repetitive welds perfectly every time. "Hand Made" is nice to say and all, but in this guys case, it failed, and even if the dealership fixes it, his paint job is compromised from here out. So don't always hate on the robots.

PDC paint coating will be compromised as if they have a weld on kit, the paint will be ground down to weld, then touched up with spray paint. There is no way on earth to re-powder coat it without stripping it down.

One of the few drawbacks of PDC, touch ups are filled with fail.
Whats funny is people like to bag on companies like Bad Boy for robotic welding, but this is the reason why robotics is superior.....the car industry went to robots for the same reason. Humans can not be relied on to do repetitive welds perfectly every time. "Hand Made" is nice to say and all, but in this guys case, it failed, and even if the dealership fixes it, his paint job is compromised from here out. So don't always hate on the robots.

Good to know that I'm not the only one that realizes this. I've actually seen a post saying robotic welding was inferior to hand welding. Guess everyone is entitled to their opinion, it's just odd that anyone could actually believe that.

With all of the good publicity Gravely has had lately here on LS (largely due to GMLC), it just goes to show that any manufacturer can have problems from time to time. The thing that matters most, is how the problem is handled.

I myself wouldn't be happy with a repair that used regular paint instead of powder coat. The paint will not last as long as the original PC will.

Your going to have to go over the entry level csr's to have them take care of you on this one. The csr's are simply there to answer questions and give general information.

I would use consumer relation sites like face book ect if I had to. These company's have dedicated reps that focus their attention on these kinds of things and can make something happen or get you in touch with someone who can.